Over the past a few decades, there is certainly been a gentle drop while in the quantity of U.S. pilots. In accordance Aviation consultants UK for the Plane Entrepreneurs and Pilots Affiliation (AOPA), there were 827,000 lively, certificated pilots in 1980. By 2011, that number experienced dropped to just 617,000. Throughout that very same 30-year period, production of single-engine planes dropped from 14,000 for every calendar year to fewer than 700.

But for the past three years, AOPA has designed understanding this declining trend and reversing it a major precedence. AOPA actions consist of developing a network of flying golf equipment, and speaking out in Washington to help you continue to keep the climbing price and complexity of aviation below command.

Thankfully, 2013 quantities are indicating a beneficial upswing, based upon facts through the General Aviation Producers Association's (GAMA) 2013 General Aviation Statistical Databook & 2014 Field Outlook.

Here's a look at what's been causing the pilot and creation decline, and good news from GAMA's 2013/2014 aviation market report.

What's been causing the decline?

According to a Washington Post article posted February 9 titled, “Small aviation businesses say pilot shortage could drive market into the ground,” there are a variety of factors that have contributed to your drop in pilots and generation over the past decades, including climbing fuel prices and heightened flying restrictions following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

One reason is that the recent economic downturn has left fewer people with discretionary income. Others place much of the blame on federal regulators, whom they accuse of making it too difficult for pilots to obtain and renew their licenses, which in turn hurts small aviation businesses and the aviation industry as a whole.

Many commercial pilots come from your GA pilot pool, and the global airline industry will need almost a half million new commercial airline pilots around the next 20 yrs, in accordance for the Boeing Pilot and Technical Market Outlook for 2013-2032.